Which Ryzen 3 CPU?

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I'm looking at upgrading my ageing rig, and quite fancy delving into Ryzen 3.

Currently thinking the 3700x is the cpu to go for, as I mainly use my system for gaming. Am I missing something, and is the 3800x worth the extra pennies?

Looking to mate it to an ASROCK Taichi X570 board with 2 kits of 8 pack 3600mhz 4x8GB kits.

Being somewhat out of the loop particularly with AMD products, is there anything I should consider regarding RAM / perhaps a different mobo.

I'll continue to flick through the pages in the Ryzen threads in the meantime.

 

[Munchies]

you would be better looking for 2*8 or 2*16gb sticks, ryzen works better with 2 stick than 4

After reading that I did a little searching and it does seem to be the case, having used intel platforms for the last 10 years i've had no problems with 4 sticks. That sucks because I kind of need 32GB of RAM and i'm finding it hard to find half decent 2x16GB kits.

3800x not worth it at all for games, pretty much zero difference.

Thanks for the confirmation.

I have the 3800X and in gaming I doubt it will be any different to the 3700X. You probably 'could' measure a very slight difference as the boost is slightly higher. What you save on that I'd plump for the 3600Mhz RAM. Whilst many 3200 kits can clock to 3600Mhz you've gone for quad channel? Slightly harder to clock I think rather than dual channel. So I'd put what you'd save with the 3700X towards higher native speed RAM. Unless of course you are already an accomplished RAM OC'er (I'm not by the way, still n00b). Those ASROck Taichi boards are widely recommended. The 3700X @ £299 is £20 cheaper than RRP. They were £319 on release.

Appreciate the advice, any recommendations on RAM, preferably 2x16GB kits, but if the worst comes to the worst i'll have to make do with 16GB until I can find some good dual channel 32GB.

With some mods, and with certain other occasional workloads, I currently fill my 16GB while it's not the end of the world it is an annoyance that i'd like to avoid with the upgrade. May have to pop into the Memory sub forums.

@Gibbo I was planning to purchase for delivery Fri, prices aren't likely to increase by then, are they?

 

[Munchies]

I'd get some 32Gb (2x16) of Crucial Ballistix Sport LT BLS2K16G4D32AESB 3200 MHz C16. Unfortunately OcUK don't stock it but readily available. It runs at 3600Mhz C16 easily which is really the minimum you should be aiming for. There's a thread on it here in the memory forum. https://forums.overclockers.co.uk/threads/ballistix-sport-lt-overclocking.18861166/

Interesting have been a bit of a Crucial memory fanboy through the years, but those sticks weren't coming up in my searches. Thanks

Based on that link, the Asrock uses T-Topology. It works well when all slots are populated, so op might be better off with a 32GB (4X8) kit.

I believe the Taichi does use T-Topology which is why I thought 4 sticks should be okay but the information I'm finding through my limited searching time is conflicting.

Interleaving works regardless of topology. One topology might allow for higher frequencies (MT/sec) on 4 sticks than another, and the whole "2 sticks are better" standard is also with respect to higher speeds, but interleaving two ranks per channel produces it's own performance boost.

In my testing, with the 3800x interleaving RAM at 3600 produced higher FPS than two sticks at 3733.
I'm sure there is a point where speed overcomes interleaving, but my sticks were unable to run fast enough in two-stick configuration to overcome the performance of interleaving 4 sticks at a slower speed.

Here's some testing don by Tom's:

https://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/amd-ryzen-3000-best-memory-timings,6310-2.html

Interesting, thanks. Did you purchase 2 x Dual channel kits of the Corsair Dominator RAM?


I'm tempted to bite the bullet, buy 4 sticks, and play with the clocks / timings, and compare to 2 myself.

 

[Munchies]

If the 3900x wasn't twice the price of the 3700x I would get it just for the sake of it No dropping the 3900x to £400 on black Friday damnit!

Thanks for all the advice and help everybody, I have placed an order for the above, minus RAM, I went with the Ballistix stuff in the end.